


Tumblestone Tower

by Sookiestark



Series: Fantastic, Frivolous, and Fragile AU's [12]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Post-Canon, Sansa Stark is Queen in the North, Starklings (ASoIaF)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-02-16
Updated: 2020-02-16
Packaged: 2021-02-28 04:08:01
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,028
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22757533
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sookiestark/pseuds/Sookiestark
Summary: The year is 325 AC. Sansa Stark has been the Queen in the North for almost twenty years. Her second son, Richard, decides to seek out who his father is. With nothing but a few cryptic sentences from his uncle, King Bran, Rickard leaves Winterfell headed to Tumblestone Tower to see if he will find the truth and the man who is his father.This will alternate between chapters with Richard, Jon, and Sansa
Relationships: Jon Snow/Sansa Stark
Series: Fantastic, Frivolous, and Fragile AU's [12]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1054934
Comments: 12
Kudos: 38





	1. Chapter 1

325 AC

Richard Stark was tired of being seen as a child. He was fourteen years old and almost a man. Mother was always telling him to be patient, to take time to think about his actions before he rushed headlong into them. But he knew what she was trying to say; she was trying to tell him was to be more like his elder brother, Edward. Edward was polite and thoughtful, as well as courteous. Edward had the dark hair and grey eyes of traditional Starks. At fifteen, when old lords saw Edward Stark in the black fur of his grandfathers, they would marvel at how much he looked like Old Ned Stark, their grandfather. 

Richard did not look like the Starks. He had red hair like his mother and deep blue eyes that were darker than hers. No one ever commented that he looked like his grandfather. Once, on a visit to Riverrun to spend some time with their cousins in the South, Aunt Roslynn had remarked had he had looked like the image of his Uncle Robb who had died long before Richard had ever been born. She had sounded wistful when she spoke and the words seemed as if they broke in the back of her throat from emotion. He had known his Uncle had been murdered in the South due to treachery but he had not realized that his Aunt Roslyn had ever met him. Uncle Edmund had tousled his hair and said, “You have the look of Robb but he had Tully eyes and your eyes are not his,”

Though Richard did not often like Uncle Edmund who tended to long-winded explanations and stories that were filled with his exploits that sounded exaggerated, at that moment, he had loved his uncle. Rickard had spoken, smiling. “Perhaps, they are from my father’s family. My father was an Umber.”

Uncle Edmund had smiled back and spoke in a very knowing and kind way. “I think you are right. I think they are probably from your father’s family.”

Richard had remembered how Edward had glared at him for lying, but he had not corrected him. Richard had wanted to ask his uncle more questions about his father but he could not get him alone again and could not bear to ask the questions with anyone else to hear.

His mother would not speak on who their father was. She had married the third son from House Umber shortly after her coronation. After all, she was a Queen and she must secure her throne with an heir. She had married Eddard Umber, a pale bookish boy of fourteen who had limited prospects but was from a loyal noble Northern House. The Umbers, a warlike group of boisterous lords, had joked if the boy, Eddard, hadn’t been so tall they would have thought him a bastard with his books and his gentler ways. 

When his mother spoke of her husband, she called him gentle and sweet but the way she spoke the words were full of a gentleness rarely expressed by his mother. Once, when he was a boy, his nanny had spoken of Queen Sansa’s husband. “He was a sweet man. Gentle. He had a terrible cough. The Queen needed someone who wouldn’t overreach. She was looking for a husband, not a man who wanted to be King.”

Edward was the only one of the Queen in the North’s children to have a known father. A week after Eddard Umber had died from his illness, the Maester at Winterfell confirmed that the Queen was pregnant. When she delivered a boy, the kingdom had been relieved. The Throne in the North had an heir. She had named him Edward, a new name that echoed his father and her father but was the boy’s own. Almost immediately after Edward’s birth, Queen Sansa’s counselors started offering other potential consorts, able young men who could help her rule and give her more children. Queen Sansa had smiled, “No thank you. I will have no more need of a husband that you choose.”

A year later, Richard was born and Queen Sansa gave her bannerman no word of who the boy’s father was. Three years later, the twins, Brandon and Robyn were born. A year after that, young Arya, the only daughter. All of them were fatherless, yet they all carried the Stark name. If Queen Sansa’s bannermen had any words to say, they did not say them in front of the Queen in the North. Some say she lay with wolves like the ladies of Bear Island lay with bears. Some said she lay with wildlings one a year and cut their throat after she was done with them. His mother, the Queen, never spoke of their father.

Of course, no one said anything to the Queen. But Richard as the second son had heard what her people might say about her sexual appetite, about her shamelessness, about his bastardy. Richard knew that bastards were wicked, base, and lustful creatures. He knew his last name should be Snow. Only, his mother’s crown kept his name from being Snow.

Once, he had asked her. It had been two years ago and he had been angry. Other boys had fathers. Other women, even ladies, would at least name the father of their children. Edward had a father, but the rest of them were bastards. So when after his twelfth name day feast, he and his best friend Jon Cerwyn, his mother’s foster, had gotten drunk on stolen ale from the storeroom. Bolstered with liquid bravery and the indignation of a second son turned twelve, Richard had wakened his mother in the night. 

Knocking on her door, her ladies’ maid had tried to shush him from waking his mother. But he had continued. Soon enough, his mother had wrapped a robe around herself and allowed him entrance to her bedchamber. In the firelight, he thought, even barely awake, his mother was lovely. “Richard, it appears you are drunk which is another thing we must discuss, though perhaps, that is best to wait until morning. However, it seems there is something that will not wait. What is it, my love? What is it that you would wake me in the night?”

“Mother, I need to know. I am almost a man and I have a right to know who my father is? Tell me.”

The Queen’s face grew pale and she raised her hand to tell her servant to leave. Richard had thought with certainty that she meant to tell him. But instead, his mother had smiled gently, “Richard, have I told you about my brother, Rickon, for who you are named? He was the youngest, full of energy and joy. He was curious and he was wild, so very wild. He was ruled by impulses and he had a temper, even as young as he was. Rickon was what the Northerners say have the wolfsblood. He had it as did my sister Arya. It appears you have some wolfsblood in you as well. Why do you need to know who your father is? What does it matter?”

“It matters. It matters to me.”

“I do not think that is reason enough. Stronger, richer men have asked me and I have not told them. I do not think you could persuade me.”

“Mother, please. Does he know about me? Is he alive? I must know. I feel lost as if I do not know who I am. Please, I must know!”

“A drunk twelve-year boy was his Queen and mother in the night to have a temper tantrum. No, Richard. I may one day tell you who your father is but it will not be tonight.”

Richard had started to protest but one of the Queen’s personal men escorted him to his room. He had woken with a headache and a sense of shame at how he had behaved. When he had gone to breakfast, his mother had told him she was sending him to King’s Landing to spend some time with his Uncle Bran, the King, and then to Riverrun. She had spoken very little to him except, “Richard, perhaps, we will find you a suitable heiress in the South to marry. It seems you are greatly unsatisfied with our Northern ways. Perhaps, you will be more suited to the South.”

In King’s Landing, Richard had been cupbearer to the King though his Uncle Bran did not often drink wine. Uncle Bran was a very odd man and often looked at Richard as if he could see everything he had ever done, good and bad. It was rumored that Uncle Bran could see all things past and future and practiced some ancient wizardry. This made him avoid his strange uncle more.

There were many things that he enjoyed about King’s Landing and the Red Keep. Richard had loved the Kingsguard and the Lord Commander Ser Brienne and spent a good deal of time in her company. He enjoyed practicing in the yard and riding horses with the other young men of Court. He loved the pageantry of the knights and the bustle of the capital. The city had so many people and so many things. It was all so different than Winterfell or even White Harbor. 

Once, he had cornered the Hand of the King, Lord Tyrion Lannister, to ask him if he knew who his father was. Richard had wondered if Lord Tyrion was his father. Though he had had a hard time imagining his mother with Lord Tyrion in bed, Lord Tyrion was one of his mother’s favorite lords in the South and Lord Tyrion had come to visit Winterfell several times over the years. Once. long ago, Lord Tyrion had been married to his mother. When he had asked him, Tyrion had smiled, “No, Richard, I am not your father. If I was, I would have claimed you long ago and made a lion of you, whether or not your mother married me. You are not mine. However, I have learned something about women. Let them keep their secrets and when the time comes, they will tell them. Your mother is fair and loves you. She will tell you when the time is right.”

The night before he had left KIng’s Landing, Richard had approached the King when they were alone, his heart racing as went over in his head how he would speak his words. King Bran had attempted a strange smile when Richard had spoken, “Your Grace, I wanted to thank you for allowing me the time to attend to you.”

“Richard, you are always welcome here. You do not have to call me Your Grace, just Uncle. After all, you are my sister’s second son. Who knows? It may be you who will be the man who sits on the throne when I pass.”

Something in his Uncle’s voice made the hair of Richard’s next stand up. Was his Uncle telling him he would be KIng one day? For an instant, Richard had an image of himself with a crown upon his head. Shaking it from his head, he struggled to find his words, “Uncle, it is said that you see things, that you know things… Perhaps, you might know, you see it is important and Mother won’t tell me…. Do you know who my father is?”

At this, the King looked at him with his unnerving stare. “Richard, you will find him when the time comes. In a tower that has been rebuilt in the heart of the wolfswood. The first snow will have fallen and the moon will be bright. You will hear the lone wolf call out. Go to the tower and you will find him. But remember, what is known cannot be unlearned and the weight of knowledge is a burden to us all.”

Richard had thought of these strange words for the past few months since he returned to Winterfell. He knew the tower that his Uncle had told him of was the Tumblestone Tower in the wolfswood. His mother had spent some funds repairing the old ruin when he was a baby. It was an outpost to keep her men when they were traveling or for messengers. Sometimes, when Tormund Giantsbane of the New Gift would visit, the royal family would spend a few days hunting and enjoying the modest rustic tower, as if they were the old Kings of Winter.

However, two days ago, his mother, Queen Sansa had departed for the First Hearth to visit with the Umbers. She had left Edward in charge while she was gone. When she had left, the first snows of winter had started to fall on the ground in the yard. Arya, his sister, had laughed and waved to her mother. It was a good sign of the first snow of the winter. But Richard had known in his heart that now was the time, the time to act on his plans. 

So, as he and Jon Cerwyn snuck past the guards, Richard knew their horses would be waiting for them tied to the trees, bags packed for the journey. They must travel fast and through the night. For by morning, Edward would realize they were gone and he would send men after the,m. But he had to try and see if Uncle Bran was right if his father would be at the tower. Richard had to meet his father and know who he was.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Jon's POV

The sky is blue like his wife's eyes, as it grows dark in the sunset. Jon paces the room waiting for her. He is too early but it has been too long since he has seen her and he could not wait for her any longer. He had to come for her and be close to her. But now, he is restless for her.

He finds it ironic that his story finishes as it began in a tower on the borderlands of two cultures in the middle of the wilderness. He knows his story isn't finished but he likes the idea that his life will be constant and that when he dies, he will die here in their bed in a tower as it started. He finds peace with her that he has not had in his entire life. She teases him that finally, a Stark girl has wedded a Targaryen. If it is late and they are alone, he will pull her to him and laugh. He does not go by his father’s name. It is unusual and it does not fit him. So he wears the name he always has, Jon Snow.

He didn’t remember how she brought him here but he felt it in his dreams, that Sansa was calling him. He began to have dreams of her crying. He took twenty men of the Free Folk and violated all the promises he had made. All his oaths and honor were air compared to Sansa's safety and wellbeing. He had ridden hard and made it to the tower in a week's time, laming a horse in the process. She had been here by the fire. Almost confused, Sansa had smiled to see him here, "I dreamed you were here and I had to come to you."

In his hands, he holds a necklace with a stone that is blue, a gift for her. Blue like the veins in his wife's skin. Blue like the snow in the moonlight. She rebuilt this ruin of a tower for them, here on the edge of the wolfswood. After all, it is hard for her to get all the way to the Wall. She has a large kingdom to rule. She whispers this is her tower of joy. It always makes him smile. She always can make him smile.

But in truth, the tower is called Tumblestone Tower, built on the edge of Long Lake. 

Jon likes his wife to wear her hair down in Northern fashion. He likes the stillness in her face, unmoving, but her eyes are constantly speaking. He likes so many things about Sansa. He likes the way her hair spills over her shoulders as she is above him naked, her skin flushed pink and her eyes wide open. He likes how much she likes to look at him while they are in bed. She never looks away and he likes her boldness. He loves her smile when she cares to show it. He loves how clever she is and how strong.

“I do not care who your father is, as long as he is not mine,” she tells him in the dark, laughing, kissing him.

The sound of her laugh is music, a sound he longs to hear, like the sound of her begging for more, hitching with pleasure and expectant release. “Please, Jon! Please!”

He tries to make the trek twice a year. She always waits for him here in the tower. He will not go further South, not even to Winterfell. Sometimes in the dark, she threads her fingers in his and says, "Come back with me, Jon."

Sometimes he thinks about it. He thinks about coming to Winterfell and making some kind of life with her and the children. It hurts him to not know his children, a deep ache. He figures that is his punishment for breaking his oaths, every oath he ever had, except one. He has always been here for her. She has always been first in his heart, first in his mind. Perhaps, they could be happy and he dreams of the luxury of waking beside her every day.

But Sansa is comfortable ruling alone. If he came back with her, they would try to put him on the throne of Winterfell or worse, the Iron Throne. He does not want any throne. He does not want to rule or anymore bloodshed, even if he wants her so much it hurts like exposure to the cold. It is better that he is the only one who suffers.

Blue like the sunniest summer day sky. Blue like the mountain lakes of the North. Blue like her eyes.


End file.
